


A = B = C

by Screamless



Category: Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Cartoon 2018)
Genre: (he doesn't know it yet tho), Angst with a Happy Ending, Autistic, Autistic Donnie, Mikey Has ADHD, internalized ableism, its typical teen "who am i" angst with that neurodivergent flare, low empathy problems amirite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:02:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24927391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Screamless/pseuds/Screamless
Summary: Sometimes it struck Donnie that his existence was entirely separate from everyone else’s.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 90





	A = B = C

**Author's Note:**

> Donnie talks really negatively about his autism in the first part of this, so if that makes you uncomfortable, I understand, and you can stop reading here. 
> 
> I'm autistic, so this is primarily an existential vent fic with some family fluff at the end as homage to my littlest brother cheering me up without meaning to. Love ya bro.

Sometimes it struck Donnie that his existence was entirely separate from everyone else’s. 

Nothing would really spur the thought; all he was doing right now was scrolling mindlessly on his phone. It would just seep in, the thought that even with everything they all had in common, his brothers still had more similarities with each other than they did with himself. He was the only autistic person in the family, and it was getting harder to forget it.

He’d always known he was kind of different, but he used to think it was more of a personality thing, not a “your entire brain structure is fundamentally different from most people and will be this way forever” thing. The day he learned that...well, it had been a weird day. Enlightening, but weird.

And because he likes to philosophize a fair bit in his free time (read: overthink), he usually takes the thought further. His very brain, the neurons inside, they were mapped all different, weren’t they? The more he educated himself, the more he realized it wasn’t “Donnie and his autism” so much as “Donnie _is_ his autism.” Or rather, you can’t have the Donnie without also having the neurodevelopmental disorder, or you simply wouldn’t have the same Donnie anymore. 

At the crux of this was the eternity of it. That’s what crawled under his scales. No matter what he ever did, unless he wanted to wipe his entire mind clean and become a featureless blank slate with no previous memories (could he do that?), he would always be autistic. Simply put, it was with him 'til the day he died.

The promise of a unique existence inside already strange circumstances (there's only so many mutant turtles to compare himself to) had been welcome at first.

Now, the thought just made his chest feel leaden.

Awkward, forever? No thanks. Can’t understand other people, even his own brothers sometimes, and he’ll just have to live with that? Yuck. Even worse, there’s no explaining he can do that will make other people truly comprehend what it’s like to live as he does? That’s just depressing. It was like he had been living inside a glass room looking out, and he had only just realized there was no door.

It was different for Raph, Leo, Mikey, he was sure of it. They could understand the thought processes going through each other’s heads. They seemed fluent enough in this empathy language to have the same ideas at the same time, communicate lightning fast, and see subtle signs that, frustratingly, always eluded Donnie’s grasp. They had something he couldn't have.

The thing was, before his “diagnosis”, he had assumed at some point he’d just... have it all figured out. He’d stop missing out on these weird invisible rules everyone seemed to agree on but never bothered to say and he’d be cool and suave and definitely a “bad boy.”

(Yeah, apparently “bad boys” need to understand common idioms and social constructs in order to fit the bad boy image, even though the purpose of the bad boy is to subvert those expectations. Talk about hypocritical.)

And then Donnie gets to learn he’s not going to figure it out. Probably ever.

Again, eternity came to mind. If he had always been autistic and it informed every aspect of his life, what was left of him? Was he just another disorder, through and through, forever and ever? Was his existence just going to be him, separate from his brothers? What was even the point of trying if it was never going to change?

Man, that’s a little dramatic, even for him. Maybe he should tone it down a little. 

And with that, he becomes aware that Mikey is in his room, making different random sounds to keep himself entertained while he practices with some weird artsy crayons. (“They’re not crayons, they are _oil pastels_.”) Sometime amidst Donnie’s intense musing, the youngest of his brothers just wandered in, plopped down with his thick paper and fancy art supplies, and began to vocalize possibly every sound known to man. As little siblings do, of course. Honestly, Donnie was just impressed he hadn’t noticed until now.

Donnie leaned over the edge of his bed. “Can you stop? My ear-holes are gonna shrivel up at this rate.”

Mikey gave him a blank stare from where he was sprawled out, plastron-down, on the floor. “Huh?”

“Stop.”

“Stop what?”

“Shrieking.”

“Oh, sorry. Sure.” He went back to scribbling and kicking his feet back and forth.

Satisfied, the purple turtle rolled back into his bed, intent to scroll on his phone and think (or pick apart his psyche) some more. Not five minutes later, more shrieks, trills, and whistles floated up. Before he could yell to keep it down, Mikey cut him off. 

“Do you think if I mix these colors it’ll come out navy? I’m out of navy.”

Donnie grumbled but accepted the distraction and squinted at the two crayons Mikey held up. A rich blue and a vibrant orange. “I’d say yes if those were acrylic paints. I don’t know about crayons. Might as well just test them out on a corner to find the appropriate ratio.”

“They’re still not crayons. And how do you know that stuff?”

He lazily rolled his wrist. “Looked up color theory and went down a rabbit hole, you know how it is.”

“So you probably know a bunch of technical art stuff.”

“Probably.”

Mikey hummed thoughtfully. They spent a few more moments in silence, but it wasn’t long before the box turtle was breaking it again.

“Hey, D, you remember how I could only do my math with you when I was little?”

Donnie rolled over to look down at his brother from the ledge of his bed, who was still experimenting with colors and going to town with the red and brown. “Yeah? You’d cry if anyone else tried to help you. And bite if you got mad enough.”

Mikey nodded and switched to red and blue. “You were the only one who made it make sense.”

It was true. Couldn’t get Leo or Raph to sit down and listen if he tried. “You were my very best pupil,” he sighed loudly. “I’d say Leon’s at fifth grade math now, at best.”

That earned him a mean snicker and a gesture to come closer. Donnie decided it probably wasn’t worth it to go back to his psychoanalyzing and hopped down to get a better look at his brother’s drawing. 

The paper was littered with practice sketches, pastels layered on pastels. The colors didn’t actually look too great (too muddled for his personal tastes), but they definitely looked interesting all bunched together like that. Even the blobs looked like they could come to life and start undulating if they wanted to. The centerpiece was where the action was, though, with a gleeful Mikey bringing down a cartoonish hammer down on Leo’s head, complete with captions “ _BONK_ ” and “ _RICE-STEALER_.”

“Nice touch with the hammer. Is my proclivity for violence rubbing off on you, Michael?” he laughed, leaning over and knocking twice on the other’s head.

Mikey shook him off and donned a faux-affronted look. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I love all my brothers equally, even when one of them eats the entire pot of rice I was saving for my lemon and chicken recipe.”

“It’s almost impressive that he didn’t get sick from that much rice.”

“I think he _did_.”

“Ha! Serves him right.” Donnie sat down cross-legged. “Why are you thinking about math anyway? Didn’t think you were that eager for advanced algebra.”

The orange turtle shrugged and resumed his doodling, picking up and examining a very stubby orange and attacking the page with it. “I’m not. I was just thinking you know how to talk math to me, and you know how to talk art. I think you’re pretty good at making things make sense.”

“Hm. You’re pretty good at understanding, yourself.”

“Yep! We’re peas in pods!”

“I think it’s ‘two peas in a pod.’”

“That’s what I said.”

“No, that’s--”

Except Mikey was right. Perhaps Donnie had been a little hasty in placing a divide between them, because he _did_ have a bit of an easier time relating to his youngest brother. 

When it came to creating, they were more similar than different. Mikey probably knew more about Donnie’s inventing process than anyone. He had to assume it went the other way as well, considering how much time he had spent listening to the younger turtle spout his ideas and techniques, be it for the traditional or the culinary arts. Even pitting his pessimistic nature against Mikey’s boundless optimism, they shared a mutual understanding of each other. Somehow, that had translated into calm and tear-free math lessons along the way.

He let his chin rest in his palm, watching his brother make broad yet calculated strokes with his oil pastels. “Okay, yeah,” he agreed. “We're peas in pods.”

Mikey beamed up at him, and curiously, his chest felt a little lighter.

**Author's Note:**

> My littlest brother has ADHD, and I'm the only he'll go to for his algebra homework. He's 11 years younger, but we kinda just understand each other. Autism and ADHD buddies.
> 
> I based a lot of Mikey's behaviors on him (cuz I love ADHD Mikey headcanons), so of course I had to include the "making noises while doing literally any activity and zoning out so hard you don't hear people talking to you."
> 
> Anyways this is the first fic I've posted in three years. Definitely out of practice but appreciate any feedback.


End file.
